


Capitolistic Holidays

by MaeveBran



Category: The Americans (TV 2013)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:14:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28147422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaeveBran/pseuds/MaeveBran
Summary: Elizabeth reflects on the holidays and her cover.
Relationships: Elizabeth Jennings/Philip Jennings | Clark Westerfeld
Comments: 2
Kudos: 10
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Capitolistic Holidays

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jouissant](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jouissant/gifts).



Elizabeth Jennings, aka Nadezhda, sat on the floor in the room she shared with Philip, her supposed husband. A pile of unwrapped toys and pajamas sat next to her along with the tubes of gift wrap, ribbons, and other accouterments of the capitalist tradition of Christmas.

She had no fear of being interrupted, for Paige and Henry knew better than to open her and Philip's door. It was one of the rules they enforced so that the children never would find out what exactly their parents did for their country let alone which country they worked for. She pulled out Philip's pajamas from the pile and wrapped them first before he came home from Martha's place in about an hour.. She had to be sure his gift was securely wrapped before he could see. 

Why they had to give each other gifts, she didn't know. It was something about keeping the cover in the fiction of their relationship. She always gave him useful pajamas and another travel book about some place they hadn't been yet, supposedly for research on places for his travel business. If she had to give him gifts, at least she'd give him something useful. 

Philip insisted on giving her jewelry, or something useless but funny. She never understood, but she always thanked Philip in front of the children.

Of all the parts of keeping their cover as Americans, the holidays were always the hardest. She could barely remember a time when her mother would take her to church and there'd be Christmas carols and after a fancy meal, or at least as fancy of a meal as could be scraped together. Sometimes it was just an extra helping of the thin soup or borscht. They at least made an attempt to celebrate before Nadezhda's father died, even if there was no presents or tree. There was at least a family outing in the snow and sacred songs. Afterward, when the holiday became just another day in the USSR, that suited Nadezhda/Elizabeth just fine. When she was separated from her Mother it didn’t seem like there was much to celebrate anyway. It was only after they moved to the US and began their long American mission that Elizabeth had to start celebrating the day.

The celebratory food, she didn't mind. Because you have to eat. And having fancy food that you only made once a year didn't seem like such a capitalistic waste. But the rampant consumerism of buying toys for children who already have more toys than they know what to do with, wrapping them in disposable paper that's only purpose is to look pretty and to be ripped apart and be thrown away along with ribbons and bows whose only purpose is to look pretty on the outside of packages, was useless capitalist consumerism and offended Elizabeth's communistic heart.

The amount of bread that someone back home could buy with what she spent on ribbon was staggering. But Elizabeth did this yearly. This yearly capitalist extravaganza was the price she had to pay to serve her country in her valuable capacity, so like a good comrade she wrapped presents and made Christmas for Paige and Henry.

So after Thanksgiving, a holiday which she was more ambivalent about, Elizabeth dutifully shopped for her family. It had been a struggle to get Philip to agree to one toy and a new set of pajamas for the children. Though often, Philip would show up with his own wrapped gifts to put under the tree. And the annual argument over balancing their cover with their communist ideals would commence.

Though by the time Henry was four, Elizabeth had given in to the argument that it's for our cover, and quietly seethed as Philip put another present under the tree. That was until last year, when Philip had been out of the house.

Christmas last year had been a uniquely American holiday for the children. They had Christmas Eve with their father in his apartment and opened presents under his small tree that he described as a Charlie Brown Christmas tree, whatever that meant. He returned them to Elizabeth before going on the Martha for their Christmas. And Christmas morning, a more subdued Paige and Henry came downstairs and opened the stockings and presents under the tree with Elizabeth. The stockings, which had held an orange, nuts, a small gift like an ornament, and a candy cane. This year, as much as Elizabeth hated to admit it, Christmas last year hadn't been Christmas. She was looking forward to having Philip home and having Christmas as is should be, even if it is an evil capitalist holiday.

She looked over at her pile of presents to be wrapped, and there was more than the usual one thing to wear and one thing fun for each member of the family. It was her way of celebrating the fact that the family was all together. There had been a moment when she thought she might not be back home from her own convalescence in time for the holidays. She had worked hard to recover in time for Henry’s birthday a month ago. Since she came home, she may have gone overboard in gift buying to show her family how much such loved them through gifts. Now that she thought about it she could see how the holiday became so capitalistic. 

The door burst open as Elizabeth finished placing the bow on the last of Philip’s gifts. She made a lunge to cover the gifts, even though she knew Paige and Henry couldn't possibly be coming into her room, to see Philip peek around the door frame carrying department store paper bags.

“Oh, good,” he said, “you have the wrapping supplies out. Mind if I join you?”

“Of course,” Elizabeth agreed. She was still reveling in the new found accord she and Philip were experiencing ever since she returned home. She used to begrudge his prescence in her life outside of the strictly nescisarry, but since she asked him to return home and her own return they had actually became the couple they had pretended to be. It was nicer than she thought it could ever be.

Philip set down his bags near her pile and shut the door behind him. He started pulling out the gifts he had purchased for Paige and Henry and they started comparing. When they had finished, Philip said, “No complaints this year?”

“Why would I complain?” Elizabeth asked. She taped the long seam on a box of pajamas for Henry. He’d look so cute in the plaid flannel.

“Usually, you accuse me of spoiling our children and being against our mission and giving in to capitalism,” Philip answered as he ran the scissors through the paper slicing off more paper then really needed for the gift he was wrapping.

“Not this year,” Elizabeth replied. “I'm just happy that we're both home and I am well enough again to be here with our family. Because regardless of what Christmas is about, it's about being here together as a family. And this year, that's enough.”

“I'm glad you've finally found a way to balance your ideals and make peace with the holiday.” Philip said as he reached for the tape.

“I was thinking,” Elizabeth started after they each wrapped another couple of pressents.  
“What were you thinking?” he asked as he wrapped another gift.

“It’s been a couple years since we went downtown to look at the decorations,” Elizabeth explained. “ So I thought if nothing came up, we could take Paige and Henry to see the Capitol Christmas tree.”

“And the trains at the Botanic Garden,” Philip volunteered, as giddy as Henry would be when he found out.

“And the trains,” Elizabeth agreed as she put the finishing touches on her last gift. “Maybe ice skating in the Sculpture garden?”

“Only if we can get cocoa,” Philip agreed.

“Of course,” Elizabeth said as she reached for one of the remaining gifts in Philip’s pile and wrapped it. 

They worked companionably for another quarter of an hour to finish with the wrapping. “Now let's go put these under the tree,” Phillip suggested.

They gathered up their presents, fitting them into Philip's bags, and balancing them in piles in their arms, and carried them down the stairs and into the living room. They unpacked them but Elizabeth neatly distributed them equally under the tree on top of the plain red tree skit with green ruffles while Philip went inot the kitchen and opened a bottle of wine. She plugged in the lights as Philip brought the wine over to the couch. She moved to sit beside him as he wrapped an arm around her, pulling her close to his side.

Elizabeth had to admit that the sight of the tree with its twinkling lights in an otherwise darkened house with presents brimming underneath it and her husband beside her on the sofa was a pretty special after all. While the consumerism and disposable paper and ribbons would never be her favorite thing, the feeling of having her family all together and having something to celebrate did brighten the darkest time of the year.


End file.
